Updates on life in Japan

Day 422 Now Henry, really, just how many times can you “decontaminate” something?

Video on the Tonankai Earthquake of 1944. M 7.9.

Some junior and senior high school students were working at an airplane assembly factory. A brick wall of the building where they were fell in when the quake occurred at 1:00 pm. The door of the factory entrance was too small for them to escape through.

The earthquake was not broadcast to the Japanese public.

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東南海地震：「地震の次は何をお見舞いしましょうか」とB２９がビラ

(h/t 放射能と食の安全を子供たちのために考える会)

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‘Hot spots’ detected at more than 20 schools in Koriyama

More than 20 schools in Koriyama city in Fukushima Prefecture, home to the crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear plant, have ”hot spots” with high radiation levels on their premises, a civil group said Sunday.

The finding was based on municipal education board documents it obtained through an information disclosure request, it said.

The education board instructed elementary and junior high schools as well as nursery schools in January to check air radiation levels in side ditches, hedges and drains on their premises. Schoolyards and classrooms were excluded as the levels there have been regularly examined.

From FukushimaDiary at:

33mSv/y measured at over 26 schools in Fukushima and it’s concealed

Posted by Mochizuki on May 6th, 2012

Over 14 elementary schools, 7 junior high schools and 5 nursery schools in Koriyama city of Fukushima measured higher than 3.8μSv/h (33mSv/y) in January, which is beyond the yearly safety limit of 20mSv/y. This measurement was ordered by the board of education in Koriyama city but they concealed this fact until a citizen’s organization requested for information disclosure, announced on 5/6/2012.

According to the disclosed information, Koriyama city board of education ordered each school to measure radiation at 8 points in street gutter, hedge and drain of rain water back in January.
In the radiation measurement of April, 20.4μSv/h was measured from a street gutter of a junior high school.

“Hot Spots” in Koriyama City’s Public Schools Revealed, as High as 20 Microsieverts/hr in the Side Drain in One School

High-radiation “hot spots” including a side drain that measured over 20 microsieverts/hour had been found in public schools in Koriyama City, Fukushima Prefecture, but the information only came to light after citizens’ groups in the city demanded the disclosure to the city’s Board of Education.

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Koriyama City finally decided to “decontaminate” those “hot spots” after the Golden Week holidays, but the decontamination work won’t be finished before the annual spring athletic meets that these schools plan to conduct, just like last year and the year before.

Nagoya mayor protests gov’t moves to restart Oi reactors

The mayor of Nagoya in Aichi Prefecture, central Japan, criticized Monday the government’s moves to restart two offline reactors at the Oi nuclear power plant, saying once a major accident occurs at the plant, it could contaminate the Kiso River which serves water to people in the city.

Mayor Takashi Kawamura told reporters, ”I made a serious protest against the reactivation” of the reactors in Fukui Prefecture during a meeting with vice industry minister Yasuhiro Nakane in Tokyo, adding that a thorough verification on the cause of the Fukushima nuclear crisis has yet to be completed.

During the meeting with Nakane, Kawamura submitted a petition, calling on the Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency under the industry ministry to soon compile a nuclear hazard map for a possible major accident at the Oi plant, about 120 kilometers west of Nagoya.